Educational evaluation of an interactive multimedia learning platform: computerized educational platform in heat and power technology

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Educational Evaluation of an Interactive Multimedia Learning Platform

Computerized Educational Platform in Heat and Power Technology

Vitali Fedulov

Licentiate Thesis 2005

Akademisk avhandling som med tillstånd av Kungliga Tekniska Högskolan i Stockholm framlägges till offentlig granskning för avläggande av Teknisk Licentiatexamen, torsdagen den 1 september 2005, kl. 10.00 i salen M22, Brinellvägen 64 Entreplan, Kungliga Tekniska Högskolan, Stockholm.

Avhandlingen försvaras på engelska.

TRITA-KRV-2005-06 ISSN 1100/7990

ISRN KTH-KRV-R-05-6-SE ISBN 91-7178-111-0

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ABSTRACT

Learning materials have multiple forms, such as books, overhead slides, computer files, blackboard notes by teachers, narration to the notes, video/audio tapes etc. Since the forms are highly inhomogeneous, it becomes difficult to collect and practically use them by a particular learner for individual study at home. Such multiple media are also expensive in management, since human resources are needed to keep the material repositories in order.

One solution of the problem lies in centralized active digital repositories. Such repositories aim to simplify the learner’s work and boost learning efficiency. With introduction of interactivity and live communication tools such repositories become learning platforms exceeding the functionality of “passive” digital libraries. Such learning platforms could be easily used both for on-campus and distance education.

This dissertation presents an evaluation of a digital repository of interactive multimedia content in the field of Heat and Power Technology: Computerized Educational Platform (CompEdu HPT). The platform evaluation consisted of integration of the tool into the university curriculum and then collection of feedback from students and teachers. The evaluation concerned usefulness of the platform for learning, aspects of instruction improvement, collecting observations about how the platform is used by students, as well as their opinions about the IT application direction chosen. The methods included: online feedback forms, questionnaires, interviews, discussions and observations.

The evaluation demonstrated that the main strength of the platform is the integration of learning materials in one portable package. The students appreciated structured and logically arranged information that was available for easy access. Coverage of a broad area of knowledge related to heat and power technology was also pointed out as an advantage with reflection on the very low price of acquisition of the materials. The most popular elements of the content in use included: simulations, lecture notes, the print function, the glossary, and calculation exercises. A major part of the students declared the high value of CompEdu in facilitating home study. Nevertheless, not all the students had a positive impression: around one-fifth of them did not find the platform useful and expressed preference for more traditional learning media. The majority of the negative opinions concerned content quality, which directly related to weaknesses of the content production and review process.

The evaluation emphasized the importance of material quality and amount as the key issue for a good learning platform with relatively smaller importance of presentation forms.

The evaluation also considered aspects of functionality from the user point of view.

Differentiation between popularity of simulations showed that simulations used by teachers during lectures have higher educational value than those for individual use only. The

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popularity of the printing option indicated a need for adaptation of digital materials for paper publishing. The general conclusion for practical use of multimedia tools in education was that high usability and simplicity of information access should be the focus point of any chosen approach in the direction.

The CompEdu evaluation suggested that after thorough content review and addition of an efficient search mechanism the platform can successfully deliver rich learning content. The platform gave an extensive real-case illustration of how multimedia can be used in educational practice. Due to the evaluation, the CompEdu e-learning group has collected rich experience and know-how in the field of active knowledge repositories. The experience will be used for development of a more sophisticated learning platform working in the global Internet environment with major focus on information accessibility by easy search.

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PREFACE

The last decade of the 20^th century was marked by a boom in the information and communication technology and corresponding business models. There was a promise that the technology could considerably improve efficiency in almost all areas of human activity in short time perspective. This promise also influenced the educational environment including schools, colleges, and universities. Later experience showed that certain aspects of the approach had been considerably overestimated and some underestimated. Different application directions were chosen in the educational environment for testing, but the test cases showed that the modern technology is not a panacea for efficient instruction and quality of human work in general.

The Computerized Educational Platform in Heat and Power Technology (CompEdu HPT) has been under development at the Department of Energy Technology of KTH during the years 1996-2004 as a response to the worldwide trend of the decade. CompEdu is a product of collaboration between several universities in the international context. The platform gathers broad range of interactive learning materials (slides, lecture notes, simulations, videos, quizzes and some other). The software has been used by students and teachers in daily educational activities; and since any kind of new pedagogical tool should be tested from the perspective of fulfilling the educational goals, CompEdu evaluation was conducted. The evaluation concerned usefulness of the platform, aspects of instruction improvement, collecting observations about how the technology is used by students, as well as their opinions about the ICT application direction chosen.

The dissertation results are expected to be useful for teachers applying ICT in their daily work and also for digital content developers. The teachers will be able to correct their attitude towards computer tools for instruction. Developers will be able to reconsider the importance and efficiency of particular instructional solutions. The final users (learners) might benefit from the work indirectly, when their expectations and needs are met in a better way.

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I would like to express my gratitude to Professor Torsten H. Fransson as the Chair of Heat and Power Technology, Royal Institute of Technology, for strong support and guidance during this work. The dissertation topic is related to the CompEdu HPT project initiated by him. Therefore enabling the study was an expression of trust of my competence in the area.

The project was financially supported by many industrial companies including Alstom Power Sweden, Alstom Power Switzerland, Birka Energi, Dresser Rand, Gas Turbine Efficiency AB, General Electric Aircraft Engines, General Electric Power Systems, Natole Turbine Enterprises, Rolls Royce UK, Rolls Royce USA, Skellefteå Kraft, Stena Rederi, Sydkraft Turbomeca, Vattenfall, Volvo Aero Corporation and Ångpanneföreningen. Also the Council of Renewal Education in Sweden (Högskoleverket) and Wallenberg Global Learning Network were financing the project to a great extent. Without their support the work would not have been possible.

I would like to thank to Doctor Helge Strömdahl from KTH Learning Lab and Professor Ola Halldén from Stockholm University for their valuable consultations concerning pedagogical aspects of my research. My dear project colleagues Marianne Salomon, Nalin Navarathna, and Yacine Abbes should absolutely be mentioned here for results of our common work, moral support, and their efforts towards a better CompEdu platform. Also all the previous developers of the platform deserve my sincere appreciation, because the work they had done became the background for my research. I highly appreciate the discussions and consultations with Professor Ivan Kazachkov, Doctor Ambjörn Naeve from KTH, and Doctor Nils Faltin from L3S Research Center in Hanover, Germany, which helped clarifying several important aspects of the project.

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LIST OF FIGURES

FIG. 1:MODERN TIMES (1936) ...22

FIG. 2:BLOOM’S CLASSIFICATION OF COGNITIVE DOMAIN...30

FIG. 3:SCORM SPECIFICATION LOGIC (ADVANCED DISTRIBUTED LEARNING,2004) ...34

FIG. 4:KNOWLEDGE RETRIEVAL TECHNOLOGICAL APPROACH (LANCASTER UNIVERSITY WEB RESOURCES,2005)...36

FIG. 5:SEVERAL CAD PROGRAMS INCLUDE KNOWLEDGE CAPTURE FEATURES THAT ARCHIVE BEST DESIGN PRACTICES AND COMPANY SPECIFICATIONS (THILMANY,2004) ...37

FIG. 6:COMPEDU COLLABORATION MAP (2004)...39

FIG. 7:COMPEDU THE MAIN ROOM INTERFACE (VERSION 3.0)...40

FIG. 8:COMPEDU CONTENT STRUCTURE...41

FIG. 9:COMPEDU QUIZ (VERSION 3.0) ...42

FIG. 10:COMPEDU VIRTUAL STUDY VISIT (VERSION 3.0)...43

FIG. 11:COMPEDU WITH OPEN BOOKSHELF NAVIGATION MENU...48

FIG. 12:COMPEDU BROWSER...49

FIG. 13:COMPEDU CHAPTER WITH AN OPEN POPUP (VERSION 3.0) ...50

FIG. 14:COMPEDU MULTI-LANGUAGE DICTIONARY...52

FIG. 15:COMPEDU CALCULATION EXERCISE...54

FIG. 16:COMPEDU SIMULATION (VIRTUAL LABORATORY EXERCISE) ...55

FIG. 17:THREE TYPES OF LABORATORY EXERCISE “LINEAR CASCADE” ...57

FIG. 18:PAGE SEQUENCE CUSTOMIZATION USING MATERIAL FROM SEVERAL CHAPTERS...58

FIG. 19:OPINION ON IMPROVEMENT OF LEARNING RESULTS WHEN USING COMPEDU...67

FIG. 20:GENERALIZED MODEL OF LMS(BASED UPON THE SCORM MODEL)...74

FIG. 21:EXAMPLE OF A LMS SYSTEM...91

FIG. 22:EXAMPLE OF AN INTERACTIVE MULTIMEDIA LEARNING PLATFORM...93

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LIST OF TABLES

TABLE 1:NUMBER OF ELEMENTS PRESENT IN THE PLATFORM (VERSION 3.0) ...59

TABLE 2:THE MOST USED PLATFORM ELEMENTS...66

TABLE 3:QUALITY MATRIX...107

TABLE 4:RECOMMENDATION FOR FURTHER ACTION...108

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NOMENCLATURE & DEFINITIONS

Distance education

– a method of teaching in which the students are not required to be physically present at a specific location during the term.

Interactivity – the degree to which in a communication process each message is related to the previous messages exchanged (Wikipedia, 2005).

Multimedia – the use of several different media to convey information (text, audio, graphics, animation, video, and interactivity). Multimedia also refers to computer media.

Pedagogy – the art or science of teaching. The word comes from the ancient Greek paidagogos, the slave who took children to and from school. The word “paida” refers to children, which is why some like to make the distinction between pedagogy (teaching children) and andragogy (teaching adults). The Latin word for pedagogy, education, is much more widely used, and often the two are used interchangeably. Pedagogy is also sometimes referred to as the correct use of teaching strategies.

Abbreviations

ADL Advanced Distributed Learning Initiative

AICC Aviation Industry Computer-Based Training Committee ARIADNE Foundation for European Knowledge Pool

ASME American Society of Mechanical Engineers

CAD Computer-Aided Design

CompEdu HPT Computerized Educational Platform in Heat and Power Technology

DCMI Dublin Core Metadata Initiative

ICT Information and Communication Technology

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IEEE LTSC Learning Technology Standards Committee of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers

IMS Instructional Management Systems Global Learning Consortium

LMS Learning Management System

SCORM Sharable Content Object Reference Model

TEL Technology Enhanced Learning

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1 INTRODUCTION

Almost all computers of today are electronic devices, which solve man-defined mathematical and logical problems through operations on binary signals. Computer input/output has been from the beginning adapted to interact with humans. Therefore the devices reflect human’s vision of the real world through interactive representations of real objects or human mental models (e.g. flight simulators, virtual “live” organisms, calculation spreadsheets etc).

Assuming that most of digital content reflects human logic and experience, one might claim that any interaction between a human and a computer is the form of communication between humans. The idea can be partly supported by the fact that nowadays computer interfaces are becoming more intuitive and human-oriented compared to the time of the technology beginning, therefore becoming communication-oriented as never before. This assumption allows shifting our focus from the computers to a technologically enhanced conventional man-to-man dialogue.

How do Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) influence our human interactions? Among others the following could be mentioned as the most important:

─ allowing reuse of once recorded simple or complex messages from other humans.

Recorded this way messages are a cheaper alternative to services demanding human presence. Such machine-based services also can be accessible any time in any place,

─ improving communication efficiency between people by removing economic and speed limitations of other communication means, such as telephony or post,

─ personal assistance by automating “secretary” routines, such as scheduling, reminding, keeping address books, checking the spelling etc.,

─ automatic collection of performance indicators corresponding to human activities (e.g. quizzes in e-learning),

─ searching, sorting, and classification of messages from other people.

All the factors mentioned above were rapidly recognized as opportunities by the business community and found practical implementations there. Also the academic environment has followed suit and started adapting ICT for education. “In the last few years, schools have been spending millions of dollars on computer technology and rushing to get computers into the classrooms. But all of the computers in the classrooms will be rendered useless unless appropriate software is available and individual teachers change instructional approaches”

(Scott, 1998).

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The idea that appropriate software and teacher-accepted instructional methods are the keys of successful use of ICT in education found the response among engineering educational staff and different computer programs started to appear in 1980s-1990s. Among the programs there was CompEdu HPT (Computerized Educational Platform in Heat and Power Technology), which tried to integrate previously separated computer instruction elements into a centralized, curriculum oriented software package.

1.1 Problem formulation for the thesis

The CompEdu platform was a part of the curriculum at the department of Energy Technology in years 1994-2004. The experience was collected along those years, several evaluations were done and the platform was improved to meet the requirements of educational process in the heat and power technology instructional field. Another pedagogical evaluation of the efforts was awaited to support or reject initial assumptions made during the development. Such an evaluation was the goal of the thesis work. The results of the evaluation were expected to give preliminary view of how CompEdu is perceived, but did not aim into a pedagogical research, which would demand more resources and a profound scientific basis to perform. The evaluation also aimed towards making decisions for further platform development.

1.2 Objectives

The evaluation objectives were as follows:

─ to identify the strongest and the weakest elements of the platform from the perspective of use by learners,

─ to identify typical scenarios of platform usage in terms of time and place,

─ to collect information and know-how on the subjects corresponding to the most useful platform elements,

─ to judge the value of the platform and to prepare the guidelines and suggestions for further platform development,

─ to collect information about practical integration of the computer technology into curricula for newcomers in the field of content development.

1.3 Approach

The evaluation was conducted in six steps as follows:

1. Study of the CompEdu structure/functionalities and use-conditions of the platform among undergraduate and postgraduate students at the department of Energy Technology, KTH.

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2. Study on pedagogy and state of the art in the area of technology enhanced learning (in the form of a literature review and by gathering practical experience from assistance for courses, which used CompEdu at the department of Energy Technology, KTH).

3. Study on pedagogical evaluation methods (based on the following literature:

Krathwohl (1998), Fraenkel and Wallen (2003) and a workshop at the University of Hanover). The clear distinction between educational research and evaluation was recognized at this step with further focus on the evaluation.

4. Selection of evaluation methods for given conditions: questionnaires, interviews, and observations.

5. Conduction of the evaluation in several groups including undergraduate students, postgraduate students and teaching personnel. The following items were evaluated:

CompEdu software package, technological/instructional approaches in online distance lecturing, and the remotely controlled laboratory exercise Linear Cascade.

6. Interpretation of the results obtained based upon the teachers’ experience at the department (group work).

1.4 Structure of the present work

The work is organized in the following manner:

1. Discussion of general pedagogy principles.

2. CompEdu e-learning platform preconditions.

3. CompEdu instructional solutions and content development process description.

4. Platform evaluation and discussion on platform development.

5. Conclusions and future work.

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2 PEDAGOGY AND COMPUTER TECHNOLOGY

2.1 Introduction

Technology Enhanced Learning (TEL) has historically existed for thousands years, since human started using tools in general. According to the Vygotsky’s hypothesis, humans use objects from their surroundings to strengthen mental processes¹ (Vygotsky, 1930/1978).

Enhancing learning with technology works in a similar way as enhancing our capabilities with mechanical tools, when a tool is an object interoperating between our body/mind and an object we are interacting with. Without a tool such particular interaction becomes less efficient or impossible. The example of a simplest technological enhancement is the paper and the pen, which serve as help for the human’s weak memory. Graphical symbols help coding complex issues, for example numbers or concepts, which without such coding are difficult to communicate or to operate with in our minds.

With coming of the computer era there has been an increase in technological enhancement for learning by increasing availability of tools. The broadened possibilities to support mental activities explain the roots of excitement about the information and communication technology development (ICT) in the pedagogical environment. In some decades the term TEL will probably disappear, because computers will dominate our lives as much as books some hundreds years ago, demanding much less attention. Contrary today TEL often signalises certain degree of complexity and difficulty in use. This complexity is partly a reason why more conventional technology (e.g. paper, pens, and blackboards) are still in relatively intensive use.

When it comes to computer tools in the educational context, in 1980s-1990s much overemphasized attention was paid to the role of multimedia and interactive media. It seems that too many resources were spent on simplifying a variety of possible learning tasks in a complex way. The situation was partly the result of an aggressive marketing strategy from software companies with promises of fast educational gains with their “perfect” tools. The tendency could be well illustrated by a retrospective view from the Charlie Chaplin’s comic movie about the industrialization times (Fig. 1). In the movie a factory worker becomes a test case for a high-tech and problematic in use feeding system. In the context of TEL the analogy was chosen, because computerization is becoming a kind of industrialization in the educational area. The analogy aims to demonstrate that certain learning tasks can be hardly improved with very complex systems, or even if so, the cost of development and support is usually high.

1 “The use of artificial means, the transition to mediated activity, fundamentally changes all psychological operations just as the use of tools limitlessly broadens the range of activities within which the new psychological functions may operate. In this context, we can use the term higher psychological function, or higher behavior as referring to the combination of tool and sign in psychological activity.”

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Fig. 1: Modern Times (1936)

Multiple examples of domination of technology over the educational expediency caused increasing awareness of the issue among educators. As a response there has been a shift from complex-in-use authoring tools to more simple once, also offering simpler interactivity and multimedia elements. The new tools focus more on reuse and sharing of content than on interactivity.

In the rush of the 80s-90s some pedagogical basics also seemed to have been forgotten. Some proponents of the use of media technologies in education claimed that introduction of new media will considerably increase the diversity of instructional methods.

The discussion in educational circles between Clark (1994) and Kozma (1994) presented two confronting opinions on the issue. Therefore it might be useful to look again at the commonly accepted pedagogical principles in order to judge about computer technology in education.

The next chapter presents key elements of instructional methods in the form of a scientific dialogue, not merely a presentation of pedagogical facts or theories. The dialogue enables showing both the state-of-the-art in pedagogy and the corresponding background of the thesis author. Statements in the quotation marks come from the “Pedagogy” article in the Encyclopaedia Britannica. This source was chosen, because the scientific discussion on the nature of learning has not been finished yet and the encyclopaedia article seems to represent commonly accepted basic “truths” about education, so no further discussion is absolutely necessary for the proposed quotations.

2.2 Realization of basic pedagogic principles using contemporary computer technology

“In the act of teaching there are two parties (the teacher and the taught) who work together in some program (the subject matter) designed to modify the learners' behaviour and experience in some way” (Britannica, 2005). The teacher’s role is “making relevant experience available to the student at the right time” (Ibid). This role very much corresponds to certain functions of learning platforms, which aim to provide such relevant experiences to a learner.

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“Although each group of subjects has something in common with others in terms of the demands it makes on the thinker, each area has also something quite specific in its mode of development” (Ibid.) Therefore each subject has certain, historically developed and proved teaching methodologies and media. The same media might not fit all needs and all methodologies equally well. Teaching/learning subjects constitute a network of interconnected elements both in terms of knowledge development in time and teaching methodology. Knowledge in the form of concepts is also a kind of network reflected in the minds of teachers and learners.

“A large part of the teacher's role is as a group leader” (Ibid.) This leadership motivator is not very easy to represent by computerized tools.

“The individual pupil also conducts himself under the influence of the group to which he belongs. His achievements and attitudes are subject to evaluation by the group, leading to support or ostracism, and he sets his standards according to these influences”(Ibid.) Group work aspect is also not easily transferable into automated computer interaction. Presence of other students might be profitable for efficient learning. But the issue is not very clear: how positive is the group influence for individual learning? This strongly depends on a learning subject and the learners. Learning playing football in separation from the group would not be the best idea, even thought such learning also includes elements of learning in separation.

“The case for uniformity is that putting a pupil with his intellectual peers makes teaching more effective and learning more acceptable. The case against it draws attention to its bad effects on the morale of those children in the lower streams. This view supports the heterogeneous class on the grounds that the strongest are not overforced, and the weakest gain from sharing with their abler fellows”(Ibid.) The issue of background homogeneity in well- designed personalized computerized learning is not expressed so strongly due to individual approach and certain separation between learning paths of students. Personalization of learning content accordingly to the needs represents one of the strongest arguments for computerized education.

“The school community is housed in a physical complex, and the conditions of classrooms, assembly places, and play areas and the existence (or non-existence) of libraries, laboratories, art-and-craft rooms, and workshops all play their part in the effectiveness of the teaching–learning situation. Severe restrictions may be caused by the absence of library and laboratory services” (Ibid.) Computerized education (CE) resolves certain restrictions of traditional “on site” education. Material digitising, archiving, distribution, and search capabilities of modern information/communication technology reduce certain restrictions of resource accessibility, which could not be accepted in the past. Virtual facilities can help in teaching subjects, where such computerized representation of objects and environments is feasible. The areas, where such representation is not feasible (mainly for economic reasons) define the constraints of computerized education. In such cases blended methods have to be used. Therefore CE cannot be completely free and “innovative” from the major media and techniques of teaching/learning.

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“The social forces immediately outside the school community also influence the teaching situation…. The overall neighbourhood youth subculture also sets standards and attitudes that a teacher has to take into account in his work” (Ibid.) Though written about youths, the conditions are probably equally influential for any learner. Universities and schools have particular specificity in terms of intellectual development environment. Such conditions might be reduced if using computerized tools only. Fortunately, with the rapid progress in the communication technologies, the problem solution seems to be relatively close. The progress can even considerably enhance learning due to creation of virtual communities between people, which would not be able to communicate otherwise. Such virtual meeting places have a potential of reducing influences of local social environment and increasing influences of geographically distant societies. Acceleration of global movement towards distance education seems inevitable assuming that communication factor is a considerable factor in education.

“The permeation of emotional learning throughout the whole educative process is not always obvious, in part because very often it is brought about incidentally. Teachers may be self-conscious and self-critical about the deliberate inculcation of emotional responses, which will provide the energy and a mainspring of social life” (Ibid.) Motivation is psychologically close to emotional involvement into certain activities. The role of classmates and the teacher in motivating a learner can be high due to social force of group and authority opinion.

Without strong social involvement learning process might slow down. But there are cases when in-class social influences can negatively influence learning performance. On the one hand modern computerized education is limiting social interaction of certain kind. On the other hand it allows controlling such social conditions.

“A person's emotional structure is the pattern of his values and attitudes… as he becomes more mature he is increasingly involved in affairs and causes far removed from his own personal life” (Ibid.) The issue of personal involvement in large-scale activities (geographically, physically, socially) probably plays an important role in personal maturation and rising believes in personal abilities. A person, who is aware of own potential and who applied skills in practice considerably differs from a person, who learned about things in theory. Distance communication aspects of computerized education might enrich value of learner’s personal development by enabling participation in larger projects and intercultural exchange.

“Educational psychologists give much attention to diagnosing preinstructional achievements, particularly in the basic subjects of language and number, and to measuring intellectual ability… There has been special emphasis on the idea of the student's readiness…

to grasp concepts of concrete and formal thought” (Ibid.) Testing of preinstructional achievements and readiness had been formalized in the form of quantitative tests long before personal computers became widespread. Standardized test methods of preinstructional capacity diagnosis can be relatively easy implemented in computerized education, for example multiple-choice questions or similar. Nevertheless, the role of teacher in analysis of students’ backgrounds prior to a next instruction step remains important, because certain

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aspects are not easily measurable by the tests. Therefore, in certain assessment stages teacher’s analytic work is necessary. Intermediate computerized tests could help the learner in the understanding of own background “white spots”. Also properly developed and fully accessible/searchable digital resources considerably simplify filling background gaps during learning somewhat reducing the need in the intermediate assessment tests. In traditional classroom filling background gaps would cause delays for the whole group. In personalized computerized learning a gap would delay work of one person only. But it could considerably increase the work of teachers.

“The progress of a lesson may consist of a cycle of smaller units of shorter duration, each consisting of instruction by the teacher and construction by the learner—that is, alternating phases in which first the activity of the teacher and then that of the learner predominates. The lesson or syllabus is thus not to be narrowly conceived of as “chalk and talk” instruction. It is better seen as a succession of periods of varying length of instruction by the teacher and of discovery, construction, and problem solving by the pupil” (Ibid.) The cyclic character of teaching/learning process used in higher education in the form of lectures, seminars and laboratory exercises is also transferable to computer environment. By the nature of contemporary computer technology, computerized educational tools are highly personal and therefore, contrary to in-class education, frequent change of activity type is relatively easy, because this does not involve more complex issue of group activity management. Also sequencing of frequent activities in computer environment could be less costly assuming that every lecture, lab exercise simulations etc. could be repeated any time without additional teacher’s work. Such flexibility allows overcoming the problem in traditional education workflow, when frequent activity changes call for achievement tests after each teaching/learning unit, but such tests are usually not performed for economic and organizational reasons. In fully computerized workflow such intermediate tests could be done, even though they are not necessary, because if the final tests showed lack of knowledge, then a leaner would actively repeat certain topics without necessity to fully involve teachers in the process of gap-filling.

“Pupils in general are organized by age into what are usually termed grades, classes, or forms… Schools frequently have some kind of streaming or multitracking whereby students are grouped according to ability so that there are separate classes for the less able and the more able” (Ibid.) To large extent the need of grouping by age/ability was dictated by economic reasons, which favour mass education. On organizational level of activities computerized education has a potential for simultaneous support of more curriculum tracks and streams compared to traditional education. In fact properly collected curricula including most learning and assessment objects could be saved for future reuse in individual study tracks. In such use of computerized materials teachers would serve as consultants rather than lecturers. Therefore, the future teachers’ role might shift towards learning material production and consulting work. In such case each student might follow relatively individual track with certain intersections with other students in group activities. The group activities could become the milestones supporting learning speed, but major part of learning would be taken individually. Indeed the multitracking idea, in other words the idea of teachers/learners

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mobility, found a resonance in teaching environment, but “there was not sufficient evidence of its effectiveness when it comes to primary and secondary schools” (Ibid.). Contrary at the university level we could assume there is awareness of self-education importance; therefore such mobility could provide good conditions for efficient studying.

“A teacher spends a disproportionate amount of his time in routine chores—in collecting and assigning books and materials and in marking” (Ibid.) In the context of learning management systems there is a tendency for efficient facilitation of routine tasks like material distribution, evaluation collection, planning etc. Quizzes and standardized tests can be collected and analysed in automatic manner. But there is no considerable improvement of analytic assessment of certain types of assignments like essays, for example.

“In general, instructional media are seen by educators as aids rather than substitutions for the teacher” (Ibid.) The reason of such situation comes from two main directions. One is that teachers often have no time to learn and use new media, especially in cases when the media are easily replaceable by simpler in delivery and use analogies (chalk and blackboard).

This is purely economic reason. The other reason is that teacher’s mind represents far broader context description mechanism for majority of presented objects than many existing descriptions could offer. In such exceptional cases teachers are used to recommend further reading, for example. In fact the Internet has started undermining the teacher’s expert position by offering multiple answers to same questions. Therefore natural shift towards computerized education is inevitable.

“In general, pictures and diagrams, fieldwork, and contrived experiments and observations are all used as concrete leads to the generalizing, abstracting, and explaining that constitutes human learning. To fulfil this function, however, their use must be accompanied by interpretation by an adult mind” (Ibid.) The need for interpretation to any presented multimedia object has become obvious with availability of multiple illustration materials in the Internet. But only small fraction of them is offering educational value due to lack of proper description and detaching from semantic context. Computerized media offer more effective contextual association and search mechanisms compared to more traditional media.

Semantic networks, which are currently under development and implementation, might dramatically change the situation with information accessibility.

“Visual material by itself may even be a hindrance; a scattering of pretty pictures through a history text, for example, does not necessarily produce a better understanding of history… What is observed rarely gives the whole story and… provides an incomplete picture” (Ibid.) Accessibility of multiple representations and contexts by means of traditional media is difficult. Computerized tools involving databases and the Internet can simplify the task of multiple context illustrations and therefore improve learning efficiency. The tools offer the possibility of sequencing and grouping information for the purpose of easy learning. The major difficulty is actual input of object descriptions and grouping them. This difficulty would be possible to overcome through consequent knowledge object management by students, who will finally become teachers themselves. Efficient knowledge object sharing

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will happen when teachers themselves start using personal digital portfolios for what they have learned.

“Reading and writing have formed the staple of traditional education…A textbook is essentially a mode of communication between a remote teacher and a reader” (Ibid.) In this context computerized education of today has reached relatively close level to the methods used in the past with widely accessible text materials for reading and efficient tools for writing. Indeed learning in many scientific subjects is very much about reading, because reading/writing is about (effective) communication, as was mentioned above. In the age of digital information the role of text media might diminish to certain extent due to development of other media. Nevertheless relative compactness in terms of symbolic encoding makes text very efficient in to-human information transfer. For example text analysis is easier and faster compared to listening to an audio recording due to the fact that no rewind action is needed for a text material, as well as unimportant text fragments could be easily disregarded.

“Programmed learning is a newer form of reading and writing. The most basic form of programmed instruction—called linear programming—analyses a subject into its component parts and arranges the parts in sequential learning order. At each step in his reading, the student is required to make a response and is told immediately whether or not the response is correct… In another kind of programmed instruction—called branching programming—the student is given a piece of information, provided with alternative answers to questions, and, on the basis of his decision, detoured, if necessary, to remedial study or sent on to the next section of the program” (Ibid.) Programmed learning can be relatively easy realized by contemporary tools used in computerized education. Accordingly to the Definition of Programmed Learning (University of Western Australia web resources, 2005) the advantages of such learning include breaking learning tasks into manageable parts, receiving feedback by a learner and proceeding at own pace in learning. In fact the technique of programmed learning can be considerably simplified (in terms of management) and enriched by usage of multimedia instead of plain text and electromechanical devices as originally developed.

Commenting on computer-based instruction the article is pointing out its disadvantage:

“The limitations at the moment centre on the learner's responses, which are limited to a prescribed set of multiple choices. Free, creative responses, which one associates with the best of classroom situations, cannot yet be accommodated” (Pedagogy, Britannica, 2005.) At the point comes the truth about fully automated teaching tools – they must be humanly intelligent in order to perform as well as a good teacher does: including flexibility of responses, large knowledge pool and understanding of psychological processes in the learner’s brain. From this perspective computer-based instruction is as far from truly automated teaching as the computer technology is far from artificial intelligence. This concerns the comparison with a perfect teaching-learning situation when one teacher is instructing one learner. In the reality of mass education such personal contact is not feasible for economic reasons and many routine mass-education activities could be successfully computerized. At this point the statement: “a computer will never replace a teacher”, is contradicting the concept of technology development for education, because the ideal case would be when similar or better

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learning results could be achieved without teacher’s physical presence. Nevertheless, since artificial intelligence is still a field for futurology predictions, the role of teachers is not endangered. At the same time contemporary easiness of access to information has already challenged the role of a teacher to certain extent.

“The (learner)² develops inevitably as a product of nature, and the main function of the teacher is to provide the optimum conditions for this development” (Ibid.) This notion is representing the point of view of naturalistic educational theory. Based on the theory, computerized education should focus on providing appropriate experience environment for natural development of a learner.

Apperception theories of education specified a sequence of steps required to carry out a lesson, which aimed at building association between new and older ideas in the mind (Ibid.):

1. “Preparation, whereby the teacher starts the lesson with something already known to the class,

2. Presentation, introducing new material,

3. Association, whereby the new is compared with the old and connected (the stage of apperception),

4. Generalization, whereby the teacher presents other instances of the new idea, 5. Application, whereby the ideas are applied to further material, carried out by the

(learner)³ individually (a problem-solving phase)”.

This method, though being criticised for restricting creative learning, has to a large extent been used in both traditional and computerized education. It seems logical to assume that at least steps 1, 2, and 3 are common for many learning experiences, where formal knowledge is a general prerequisite for any next learning step. This includes basic knowledge about an object/phenomenon in a study field. In a case of learning arts, music or sports relating to the background in formal terms might be more difficult, nevertheless this is commonly used, because such knowledge also includes certain formalized concept elements or naturally developed and later named abilities.

Contemporary the computerized enhancements are capable of facilitating steps 1, 2, 3, and 4 of educational methods based on the apperception theories by subject descriptions enriched with multimedia and interactivity. Step 5 in general will require presence of the teacher able to analyse problem solutions submitted by a learner. It seems that the most difficult elements for computer support will be creative problem-formulating and problem- solving. Since conceptual integration and coordination between those learning steps has not

2 “Child” originally in the text.

3 “Child” originally in the text.

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been resolved in an automated manner, the role of a teacher will focus on such issues. At the same time there are indications that the role of a teacher working purely as a medium between a knowledge source and a learner might considerably diminish, since access to quality learning material is becoming easier with the Internet. Nevertheless the prediction probably discriminates the fact that physical presence of a teacher and class-mates might strongly motivate for learning, therefore the role of the “natural” lecturing forms will not disappear.

Another vision of future teaching is that it might transform into pure didactic process organization and planning, when learners will study mostly individually, acquiring theoretical and some practical knowledge, using computer tools and contacting the instructors when necessary, and then attending problem-solving sessions conducted in classrooms or online.

From such interpretation follows that knowledge materialization might become increasingly important, because someone has to catch and represent knowledge symbolically for further use in digital form. Also curriculum-object production, meaning creating detailed course plans with links to learning objects, might become a common form of activity in the educational environment.

Conditioning and behaviourism theories do not provide direct methods of training, but help in understanding the reinforcement (e.g., a reward) phenomena. At the university level such positive reinforcement could be achieved by rising satisfaction from successful problem solving, which gives the feeling of power.

The conditioning and behaviourist theories also give a simplified model of symbol learning, when, for example “in the human situation, learning to recognize the name of an object or a foreign word constitutes a simple instance of stimulus learning. Such an event is called sign learning, because, in knowing the sign for something, a person to some extent makes a response to the sign similar to that that he would make to the object itself” (Ibid.) As an example in situation of learning a formula E=mc², first process would be the memorisation of the equation, and after a sequence of rewards further use of symbol “E” will be enough to cause conditioned association with the full equation in appropriate context. In computerized education such memorization could by easily facilitated by hyperlinked windows, so that no considerable work is needed to refresh the association. Hyperlinks also help protecting against unconscious operation by still-not-well-learnt concepts and latest dissatisfaction with learning results.

“Cognitive theories…assume that perceiving and doing, shown in manipulation and play, precede the capacity to symbolize, which in turn prepares for comprehensive understanding… Cognitive theories of learning also assume that the complete act of thought follows a fairly common sequence, as follows: arousal of intellectual interest; preliminary exploration of the problem; formulation of ideas, explanations, or hypotheses; selection of appropriate ideas; and verification of their suitability” (Ibid.) Therefore cognitive theories call for a reverse of the lecture-exercise learning sequence, making the exercise to precede the lecture. E.g. a practical experience should be put prior to the theory explanation, therefore enabling natural hypothesises creation in the learner’s mind with further verification of the ideas.

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“The motivation of cognitive learning depends less on notions of reinforcement and more on standards of intellectual achievement generated by the learner himself” (Ibid.) Cognitive theories aim at higher levels of intellectual activities. The cognitive levels were formally presented by the educational psychologist Bloom (1956), who pointed out that levels of abstraction of questions in tests that were common in educational settings of USA in the 50s often did not require deeper intellectual activities. The only knowledge they were asked to demonstrate was merely information recalling. Fig. 2 (Teaching, IMI Home, 2005) illustrates the classification of cognitive domain called the Bloom's Taxonomy. The classification puts higher priority towards practical aspects of learning where assessment, research and problem solving are put on the top of the pyramid of intellectual complexity.

Fig. 2: Bloom’s classification of cognitive domain

Potential value of cognitive approach in education can be development of intellectuals with practical skills instead of persons possessing mainly factual knowledge. In the age of Internet the factual knowledge is rapidly devaluating. Higher-level knowledge and practical skills are becoming more competitive.

“…The second half of the 20^th century saw a revival of the concept of the structured wholeness of experience…. A new experience…begins by seeming relatively formless and unstructured. The learner, who does not yet know his way about the material, begins by seizing upon what appear to him to be important features or figures. He then reformulates the experience in these new terms. The insight gradually becomes more and more structured until finally he reaches an understanding or a solution to the problem…” (Pedagogy, Britannica, 2005.) The concept represents so-called structural theories of learning, which seem to incorporate pedagogical theories described above by means of network development and interactions. In such model learning is a process of continuous mental model rebuilding based on old and new experiences. There has not been much success in practical implementation of the structural theories, probably because of their complexity.

Multiple theories have been developed for learning process explanation. High abstract level of the theories implies the necessity of teacher’s presence in both knowledge content

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creation and learning procedures. Computerized education has simplified organization, presentation and distribution of knowledge, but is not very close to efficient learner modelling and therefore in machine-intelligent response to the learners needs. There are no significant indications that computer technology per se is capable of improving education in terms of core cognitive learning processes. At the moment the much simplified learner models used in computerized education are mostly representing properties of a statistical human, than an individual, because learning theories are relatively imprecise in reflecting the complex nature of human intelligence.

An ideal fully computerized teaching system will sustain a leaner model, comprehensively process different responses from the learner (including verbal, nonverbal and neuropsychological activities), and based on the obtained information will create optimised educational situations using existing semantically described knowledge databases.

There has been a strong trend in pedagogy to follow discoveries of the natural sciences. This probably demonstrates that the natural sciences (especially brain studies) could bring effective explanations of what learning is about. Such reasoning is based on the assumption that general principles of brain work can be explained in purely mechanistic/mathematic terms. Research in the ICT area towards modelling of learning mechanisms has a great potential of influencing the pedagogical science. At the same time the pedagogical theory serves as verification and control of the ICT solutions being proposed.

Until now there have been no profound show-cases when technology demonstrated to change the way we learn, therefore ICT should be considered as a tool extending possibilities, but not changing the basic learning mechanisms. On the other hand teaching seems to be influenced to a larger extent by the technology development. New tools allow presenting information in new ways and involving learners in multiple simultaneous interactions, which were not possible earlier. Probably the best example of such tools is the interactive tutorials and simulations, when problem-based learning occurs without instructor’s participation. In such conditions teacher’s role as a content developer might become highly important, at the same time the issue of proper intellectual property protection becomes very important as well.

2.3 E-learning today and development trends

Several computer technologies have been proposed for use in education. The ones, which seem to reach a stable position and broad practical application, support the following activities:

• Content exchange and sharing,

• Management of educational activities,

• Audio/video communication,

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• Multimedia and interactive content⁴ authoring.

Internet-based and offline digital repositories are probably the most commonly used technologies nowadays. The first offline repositories to appear were software packages on floppy disks and CD-ROMs, also working in local networks. The Internet provided broad sharing possibilities and increased information accessibility. Nowadays, online repositories are a competitive alternative to traditional public libraries. A typical repository contains electronic copies of books and journals. Some repositories also offer other objects, such as multimedia, computer codes, software etc.

Problems with digital content compatibility stimulated development of worldwide standards for content presentation. The standards also simplified content development and distribution. The work towards unification has been evolutionary natural, since the Internet- access became relatively common. For example the simplest presentation standards include image formats GIF and JPG. Word and Power Point have dominated content authoring to a certain extent. Interactivity and multimediality in the net is widely distributed by Flash and Java. HTML language became a universal way to present static data for reading online.

Online communication technologies have started to successfully compete with traditional telephony. Text chat, audio/video via IP, and application sharing are the key technologies for meeting people distantly. Internet-based communication platforms enabled virtual classes, web seminars, conferences, online meetings etc.

The next step in the content sharing is sharing database-related kinds of data, and one- way passivity of HTML has been extended by bi-directional and commonly acceptable XML.

The latter is a standardized representation of complex data-base like structures in the form of text-tagged files. Whereas HTML served mostly for human-to-human communication, XML offers efficient machine-to-machine communication.

Learning management systems represent the latest trend in e-learning. A learning management system (LMS) uses the technologies above and additional (usually server-based) software to support educational workflows and processes. Since major educational organizations function similarly, the system helps automating typical tasks and data streams.

“It refers to a suite of functionalities designed to deliver, track, report on and manage learning content, learner progress and learner interactions. The term “LMS” can apply to very simple course management systems, or highly complex enterprise-wide distributed environments”

(Advanced Distributed Learning, 2004). In general LMSs “industrialize” education the same way it happened in other big-scale commercial areas, like aerospace or automobile industry.

An example of an LMS is given in the Appendix 1.

The current trend in computerization of learning is to a large extent LMS-oriented, and also distance-learning oriented. Since learning to a large extent is about “learning-object

4 An example of multimedia interactive platform is given in the Appendix 2.

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consumption”, and production/consumption of learning objects is distributed by the nature of the Internet, several standards concerning data exchange and process management have been established and recognized as important for sustainable development of e-learning. The initial purpose of the standards was to avoid “locking in” of content in proprietary commercial platforms, when reuse of it in other platforms becomes difficult or impossible. Some parts of the standards are still under development stage. The main organizational bodies involved into development of the standards, which are actively collaborating to each other, are as follows:

• IMS (Instructional Management Systems Global Learning Consortium),

• ADL (Advanced Distributed Learning Initiative),

• IEEE LTSC (Learning Technology Standards Committee of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers),

• ARIADNE (Foundation for European Knowledge Pool),

• AICC (Aviation Industry Computer-Based Training Committee),

• DCMI (Dublin Core Metadata Initiative).

Probably the most prominent reference model in relation to practical applications today is SCORM (Sharable Content Object Reference Model) by ADL, which is adopting essential elements from AICC, IMS, IEEE LTSC, and ARIADNE. Accordingly to the article published at the e-learning web page (University of Bath web resources, 2005) in the U.S.A.

if online content providers and LMS manufacturers want to be eligible for future government work, they will have to conform to certain aspects of the ADL strategy. The strategy is implemented partially in the SCORM. The SCORM, not being a standard itself, “serves to test the effectiveness and real-life application of a collection of individual specifications and standards. SCORM provides a foundational reference model upon which anyone can develop models of learning content and delivery. For example, systems should be able to "share" data about how learners access courses, their progress in the course, and their pretest/posttest scores. Through the application of the specifications and standards from the various groups, SCORM provides the framework and detailed implementation reference that enables content, technology, and systems using SCORM to "talk" to each other, thus ensuring interoperability, re-usability, and manageability” (MASIE Center, 2003).

“SCORM is a suite of technical standards that enables web-based learning systems to find, import, share, reuse, and export learning content in a standardized way” (Randall House Associates, 2003). SCORM is explicitly oriented towards Web environment, assuming that content, which can be delivered through the Web, can be delivered on CDs etc. as well. The reference model basic structure is presented in the form of a library with books as shown in the Fig. 3.

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Fig. 3: SCORM specification logic (Advanced Distributed Learning, 2004)

Another promising set of standards (partly reused by the other standard bodies) is the IMS open specifications. The specifications, which are being introduced by LMS and e- content software companies concern: meta-data, enterprise, content packaging, question and test interoperability, reusable definition of competency or educational objectives, digital repositories, learning design, simple sequencing, and accessibility issues (IMS Global Learning Consortium, 2003).

Metadata⁵ play important role in the particular standards related to e-learning. LOM (Learning Object Metadata) standard by IEEE LTSC focuses on enhancement of search, evaluation, acquisition, and use of learning objects. It includes some recommendations by the Dublin Core Metadata initiative. Particularly LOM specifies tag vocabularies and tag taxonomy for learning objects. Such tags could be attached to a learning object in the form of an XML file, for example. The metadata include among the others: author/co-author names, version number, language, coverage, interactivity level, property rights, software used to open a learning object etc.

5 Data about data.

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“In e-learning, the key issue is neither the interoperability nor the reusability of content, but rather the support of learning as a cognitive and constructive process.” (Lytras et al., 2005). The future trend in computerized education is the shift from mass-education towards individual education. A new method reflecting the shift is based on individual search/browsing of the Internet learning resources and extracting the most essential and relevant knowledge (in relation to a problem being solved by an individual in the search time- period). This approach was called “knowledge pull” opposing the “knowledge push” that represents the older curricula-based educational approaches (Naeve, 2005). “In the “pull”

case, knowledge flows from the selection activity to other knowledge manipulation activities and is essentially triggered by an individual's “knowledge seek” request. Contrary to the above, in the “push case”, knowledge flow gets triggered automatically without an explicit request from any knowledge seeker” (Chandrasekar, 2005). The main obstacle towards active use of the “knowledge pull” method lies in limitations of the search mechanisms. Responses to queries following the natural language properties typically do not offer answers, which are close semantically to a searcher’s query. Using more advanced search mechanisms allows narrowing the search, but still requires material-sieving work from a learner, often with poor output. The reason for such results is that the engines use literally unintelligent way to judge about semantic structure of the documents.

Specialized electronic libraries/repositories use search filters based on metadata sets, but the metadata often have different structure in different repositories. Therefore there are no general search mechanisms, which make sure all relevant documents from the World Internet- accessible content are present in the search results. Such metadata are typically static, e. g.

reflecting subjective views on the content at the moment of the content publication.

It has been generally accepted that machines are incapable to judge about documents’

semantic structure, if such structure has not been introduced into the documents by humans in a formalized machine-readable way.

Some researchers suggest that introduction of advanced metadata tagging and corresponding mechanisms of human-like logical inference might change the paradigm of the WWW-content access/share. Accordingly to the model, content metadata will not be a static part of corresponding documents, but will dynamically reflect content access, modifications, popularity, quality etc. Also the model implies there is an “idealistic” knowledge structure, which can be formalized in terms of ontologies describing interconnections between objects in the real world. From this perspective the ontologies would serve to represent “common- sense” logical operations performed by humans when filtering/sorting information. The next generation of the Web, implementing the mechanism, is called Semantic Web that will enable machine-“understanding” of web resources, so that information request from a human could be passed from a machine to a machine preserving semantic structure of the request.

The framework of Semantic Web research is presently supported by development of semantic content processing standards/frameworks such as: RDF (Resource Description Framework), OWL (Web Ontology Language) and UML (Unified Modelling Language).

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Further future and more futuristic perspectives of e-learning could be mentioned as well. Much higher value from computerization might be achieved when the machines are actually capable to learn and teach. If they cannot learn, they will be only able to transfer knowledge copies from a human to a human. The problem concerning automated content production (“extraction of knowledge”) could be hardly improved without literally wise machines. This futuristic concept is closely related to the research in the Artificial Intelligence field. At the same time there are certain solutions, which already today allow certain automation of learning-object creation through the use of knowledge-capturing mechanisms.

Such mechanisms make use of the synergy effect between human and computer capabilities as shown in Fig. 4. The figure illustrates the emerging technology called “knowledge retrieval”, which allows blending computer and human skills through human behaviour registration/analysis by a computer.

Fig. 4: Knowledge retrieval technological approach (Lancaster University web resources, 2005)

The model of knowledge retrieval is the first step in very primitive machine understanding. In this context “understanding” means time-space pattern recognition as it was suggested by Jeff Hawkins (2004). An interesting example of intelligent behaviour pattern retrieval was lately described in the Mechanical Engineering journal (Thilmany, 2004). The

Fig. 5 from the journal shows how best engineering practices in the machine design could be preserved for other users in such a system.

Educational evaluation of an interactive multimedia learning platform: computerized educational platform in heat and power technology